Surgical clip appliers are commonly used for ligating blood vessels, ducts, shunts, or a portion of body tissue during surgery. Most clip appliers typically have a handle with an elongate shaft having a pair of movable opposed jaws formed on an end thereof for holding and forming a ligation clip therebetween. The jaws are positioned around the vessel or duct, and the clip is crushed or formed on the vessel by the closing of the jaws.
Clip appliers that are configured to deliver multiple clips typically include an advancer mechanism that sequentially advances the clips into the jaws of the clip applier. Many clip appliers have jaws that are angled with respect to the shaft for better visibility. The angled jaws require that a clip being fed into the jaws change orientation. This change in orientation can lead to misalignment between the advancer mechanism and the clip, which can result in the clip being improperly fed into the jaws, further resulting in a malformed clip being delivered to the tissue. Problems can also arise as the advancer mechanism retracts behind the next clip and fails to engage the clip to advance it into the jaws.
Accordingly, there remains a need for improved methods and devices for applying surgical clips to vessels, ducts, shunts, etc.